And What After You?
by Adia Rose
Summary: This is set in the first few episodes of season 1, shortly after Thelma was killed. It is about the relationship between Thelma and Cassie and how Thelma reacts to her 'life' after death. Hopefully better than it sounds! Please review as it's my first fic
1. Chapter 1

Nine days. It had been nine days sine Thelma had felt the knife sink desolately into her heart. Nine days had passed since she had felt her soul unceremoniously torn from herself, from Cassie, from the living. She sat, on her bench that the school had so casually and injudiciously dedicated to her memory. She rolled her eyes at the thought of it,

"Did the really think I'd care about a sodding bench?! I'm dead for Christ's sake. Some memory of me…give the dyke a bench!" She thought to herself in sardonically wry amusement, whilst absentmindedly chucking malteasers into her mouth.

Squinting her eyes towards the sun that was shining piercingly in the cold autumn chill. Thelma looked out over the lake where her body had been found. Gentle ripples were moving through the glassy water and Thelma could feel the hairs prickling on the back of her neck. She remembered seeing Cassie's face when her body had been drawn from the water. She could still see the tears, the despair and the guilt which Thelma had to witness and could not comfort. She remembered looking at her own pale and vacant face, desolate and somehow scared. Her own dead face had looked scared, sad and alone as her body lay limp and abandoned in the arms of a policeman.

"Mena Suvari, naked in the shower."

A voice spoke slowly and tantalisingly close into Thelma's ear causing her to jump and spin around, finding herself mere millimetres away from Cassie's smiling face, eyebrows raised, her lips almost touching Thelmas.

"What?!" exclaimed Thelma, confused and startled by the sudden thrust into reality.

"Sorry. Didn't know ghosts were so jumpy!" Cassie answered with a smile, taking a seat beside Thelma. She gazed out at the lake and breathed in the crisp autumn air.

"I just thought you could do with some cheering up…you look like a right moody cow. Even for a ghost," Cassie added.

"Nah…not really my type. Too much like a bloody alien. Now Angelina, she's my girl." Laughed Thelma, raising her eyebrow ceaselessly, lips pouted in a scrunched faux kiss face which made Cassie smile and laugh warmly at her.

"So where've you been anyway?" Asked Thelma as she picked up a sausage from a pile that she had stashed next to her on the bench, and started to eat, "I looked for you everywhere this morning," Thelma muttered thickly and with much difficulty, her mouth being so full of food. "Went spying on Roxanne. You won't _believe_ what she does when she's alone, or _thinks_ she is." Laughed Thelma with a wink before shoving an entire sausage indecorously into her mouth.

Watching this, Cassie replied,

"You know, you talents really were wasted on women!" There was an amused sarcasm in her voice, "Anyway, I was nowhere…I was, out," she finished abruptly, suddenly appearing hugely interested in the arm of the bench next to her, a slight frown of feigned innocence on her face. She momentarily snatched a guilty glance at Thelma who had stopped mid eating, the sausage in her hand hovering near her open mouth, both eyebrows raised in questioning and suspicion of Cassie.

"Ok, I was with Troy." Sighed Cassie "And I know that you don't like him much but I do Thelma - don't give me that look – and I'm not stopping my life just because Azazeal is around. We were only playing pool and talking, he's really sweet."

"Oh," said Thelma in a voice that didn't quite sound like her own as she tried to hide her dismay that Cassie could become involved with Troy. Cassie had said that she wasn't stopping her life, but why couldn't she understand and care that Thelma had, and didn't have a choice. Thelma in life had been so deeply in love with her best friend that it sent shivers down her spine just to be near her. She would have done anything for Cassie, she had died for Cassie and Cassie just never seemed to understand. And in death nothing had changed, but running through Thelma's mind were all the thoughts she tried to repress. That she would never again hold Cassie, never again feel the touch of her skin, the warmth and safety of her embrace. She had lost her best friend and the only person she had ever really loved in one excruciating assault. She felt so painfully lost and alone that she forced herself to push all thought away from her and she angrily blinked back the tears that she could feel beginning to burn behind her eyes. Desperately scrabbling to change the subject of her thoughts she turned to Cassie,

"So, didn't you enjoy your dream last night?" Thelma spoke with a coy smile, remembering the steamy encounter that she had instigated in Cassie's dream.

"Oh yeah," said Cassie sarcastically, remembering and holding back a smile "and when exactly could you ever imagine me saying 'lets polka'?!"

"Not THAT bit" said Thelma in false exasperation "plus that was all you, I was just arriving at that point!"

"Well if you ever put me in frills again I will kill you for a second time!" Cassie retorted, wide eyed and nodding.

"Hey I liked the outfit, it gives you the whole sex kitten thing." Replied Thelma earnestly with a grin. "Who needs men?! You loved it!" smirked Thelma, pouting her lips out at Cassie.

"No, you were crap." Said Cassie, getting to her feet and striding away towards the school, looking back with a grin, to see Thelma looking confused and seeming to only just work out what Cassie had said. And looking at Cassie's triumphant and grinning face, she shouted after her,

"HEY!"


	2. Chapter 2

As she watched Cassie's back making its way up the steps to the school, Thelma felt her heart sinking. She only felt whole when she was with Cassie. Death in hindsight had been the easy part, "it's the afterlife that's the bitch" thought Thelma. She had no-one now, her only companion, her everything was Cassie, the world was empty for Thelma, she was forced to wander crowded streets, through faceless masses, knowing that engulfed in the crowd, she could not be more alone. Watching people live their lives was like a constant and unrelenting torture for Thelma, but watching Cassie living hers…without her was nothing short of searing agony.

After another week of her merciless solitude, Thelma was beginning to despair at her loneliness and was desperate for anyone to speak to her, to give her some comfort but with Cassie as her only salvation she was not hopefully. She sullenly walked up to Cassie's room, a packet of salt and vinegar crisps in each hand, hoping to see Cassie, though having no expectation. She entered the room to find Cassie stood before the mirror, examining how her arse looked in what Thelma thought was an indecently short skirt. She bit back her longing and jealousy and asked,

"Where are you _going_ like that?" looking at Cassie's legs, her eyes sweeping upwards, lingering for just a second at her hips before moving to her stomach and up to her chest. Thelma gazed at Cassie's breasts perched high in her tight haulter, her perfect curves, soft skin. Thelma wanted to touch her so much, feel her loving caress.

"What do you mean? I have got friends Thelma. I know you hate to admit it but I am moving on. I'm not going to sit around waiting for Azazeal. I have other plans and a life unlike you." Cassie's words bit deep into Thelma and her heart seemed to have contracted within her chest. She sank to the floor, her breath catching in her throat, tears spilling down her ghostly cheeks, tears she didn't even know that she could cry. She never knew that she could express her feelings for Cassie this way, she had always kept them so locked away. The only time she had shown Cassie the truth was the day that she died. Azazeal had stolen any chance Thelma had had and now Cassie seemed to be stealing the last hope. But this sudden breakdown seemed to have released something in Cassie and she rushed over, crouching next to Thelma. Thelma wanted so much to hold her, to collapse into her arms and feel safe again. She was so used to being strong, even when she had been murdered, she watched her own memorial and stood by Cassie, without a word of grief and simply joked. She had always wanted to appear in control, she was to afraid to fall apart, but there was nothing left inside her but tears.

"Oh my God, Thelma. What's wrong? Thelma I'm sorry, I didn't mean…"

"You don't understand." Interjected Thelma. "You can leave and be away from me, you can be with Troy, you can go to classes, you can live your life." Tears were plummeting in a ceaseless torrent down Thelma's face, dripping onto the floor hopelessly.

"I'm doing everything I can to live my life!" said Cassie with unabashed exasperation. "I am trying everything to move on and not let Azazeal win. You think this is easy? I have to spend every second wondering what he will do to me next, I want a life!"

"You're all I fucking have," shouted Thelma in utter, crushing despair and overpowering desperation. "You are everything I have now. I lost my family, my life. I can never talk to anyone again, never hold anyone, I will never be loved and I did it for you. I sacrificed everything for you because…because, I love you. I love you more than the world, more than anything." Her eyes were burning with tears and breaths were ragged, she could feel herself shaking.

"I don't know what I am to you any more. You don't even want me around." She finished between gentle sobs and shaky breaths. She chanced a glance up at Cassie, who's face was blank. She looked slightly afraid, and was it guilt behind her eyes or sadness, or perhaps anger?

Thelma looked into Cassie's eyes, Cassie's magnetic stare catching in Thelma's own. She searched for feeling, any clue to what Cassie was thinking, any emotion. Without warning Cassie rose and moved towards the door.

"Cassie…" Thelma pleaded, fresh tears springing into her dark eyes.

But Cassie with a single glance back at Thelma left the room.

---- I have LOADS of ideas planned for this story if people are interested in it. Let me know.


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